Distinguish between the northern and Carolina DBT

Great question! To make it even more difficult there is a lot of interbreeding between those species because of the release of many terrapins from turtle farms after the passion for terrapin soup died off in the early 1900s. I have a terrapin whose linage traces back to coastal New Jersey and she looks like a concentric centrata- light shell, white skin, curled posterior margins, etc. but her limbs feature the more blueish gray color common to this bay area. A lot of those from the Chesapeake Bay area (or Chesapeake phase) and Mid-Atlantic look very similar to the concentrics of the Carolinas (and many probably are). On Jonathan’s page (www.diamondbackterrapin.com) he has photos of each subspecies and with the standard phase you can see the differences but each has variations that look incredibly similar. I think it is pretty difficult until you get to some of the more southern subspecies and even those can have similar features at times. -Scott—– Original Message —-From: GOURRY CHAN